Evolution continues. In recent times, evolutionarily speaking, various somewhat reproductively isolated human populations have acquired genetic differences from the rest of our species that are adaptive in their own situations. For example, the people of Tibet are better able to function at high altitude, and the genetic basis of this has been worked out.

There are populations that can, on average, dive deeper and hold their breath longer, by a considerable margin, than the overall average. There are other populations, in the Andes, with their own, and quite different, adaptations to high altitude. The prevalence of Samoans in the NFL is unlikely to be a simple accident; in times past, Samoans with strong arms were more likely to make shore ahead of the storm, or to be on the winning side of some naval skirmish.

As humanity has fanned out across the globe and into more and more varied climes and environments, some quite recent [e.g., high altitude, big cities] it stands to reason that evolution has only sped up.

Ten thousand years from now, they’ll be arguing about whether or not we here count as human. And even that’s the conservative prediction. What about AI? What about genetic engineering?

Meanwhile, can we perhaps notice that polar bears are evolving into marine mammals? Before our very eyes? This may be cut short by the current mass extinction event; if the arctic sea ice fails entirely in summer, they’ll be very much under the gun. But still, it has to be clear what the trend until now was pointing at.